Drum Sander

Having thoroughly enjoyed making the Little Bess Ring Box, the smallest project I’ve ever made in boxes, I have decided to go to the other end of the scale. I’ve always hankered after a Drum Sander but could never afford the £500+ price tag. I idly tapped ‘drum sander’ into the search box and found that not only was I not alone in not being able to afford one but that there was a solution. Build you own. There are numerous ideas out there but the soundest seems to be ...

Hello again, fans of the drum sander. Yesterday I wrestled home an 8’ x 2’ sheet of 3/4” MDF. I am one of those fortunate to be at school when the metric system was being introduced so I can still speak imperial, which is lucky as the plans for this thing are American in origin. The plans call for 3/4” ply for the table and drum parts but I have decided (he’ll regret it he always does when he makes these assertive decisions) that MDF is going to be more appropria...

Looking back I really don’t know what I was worried about. I fettled the bandsaw, with a 1/4” blade installed, and set up the jig fairly easily.Set up some relaxing music on my MP3 player, Beethoven – Pastoral symphony, and set about making MDF donuts (yes I can also speak American).What with the music, the steady progress and the way each little corner would tap, tap, tap against the donut just before it was about to fall off I settled into what I can only assume is a Zen s...

Hello all. Been a mixed day today. Pist that I have a problem deciding how to mount the motor. My old motor doesn’t have feet along its side, as in the design. Its only mounting points are on the end where the spindle emerges. I’ve discussed this at length in the comments of the last blog entry with Autumn and jm82435 (thank you both for your valuable input) and I’ve decided to take this offline and have a major think.
So how to pick myself up. Well the drum glue-up went ...

After some thought and more than a little scribbling I came up with this bracket to hold the motor. Its made of 15mm birch ply and so relatively robust .May not look much but in my experience simplest is best. Here is the motor installed.You basically loosen both bolts. Hold the motor up slightly to fix the belt to the appropriate pulleys. Let it drop to take up the slack and tighten the bolts back up. The pivot point is the top right of the three holes.The darn thing works in all three speed...

Interesting couple of days. Did a slight remake to the motor bracket and coach bolted the whole issue in. Mounted the height adjuster and the table. Also made a dust cover, a bit clunky but it does the job. Took one final look at the drum
and thought ‘Its going to be a lot smoother when you next see it. Attached the dust hood.Made up a board with 60 grit on top and set about trueing up the drum.I’m using the medium drum speed, 950 rpm. Cranked up the height adjuster until I jus...

I bet you’re all thinking “That darned fool has forgot to cut the little circular dents in the guide rails for when the drum is close to the table”, aren’t you?Well I haven’t, so there. Here’s how I do it. Now the drum is a nice cylinder I attach two 1” strips of 60 grit to the ends using double sided tape.Then I wind the table up, slowly, to cut them, soThe 60 grit and tape is then removed. I then applied the adhesive backed velcro ( 4” wide st...

Its been a little over a year since I made this Drum Sander. This update shows minor modifications and it’s present condition including any wear on the MDF table.
Here she is without the dust hood.
As you can see the promised paint job never happened. This Sander has been in more or less continuous use, on pretty much every project of mine, for the past year. There hasn’t been time to paint it (and let it dry).
As for wear on the MDF table, there is minimal surface sc...